Whistleblowing process in Finnish health care

Wrongdoing in health care is harmful action that jeopardizes patient safety and can be targeted at the patient or employees. Wrongdoing can vary from illegal, unethical or unprofessional action to inappropriate behavior in the workplace. Whistleblowing can be considered as a process where wrongdoing is suspected or oberved in health care by health care professionals and disclosed to the party that can influence the wrongful action. Whistleblowing causes severe harm to the whistleblower and to the object of whistleblowing complaint, to their personnel life and working community. The aim of this study was to analyze whistleblowing process in Finnish health care. The overall goal is to raise concern about wrongdoing and whistleblowing in Finnish health care. In this cross-sectional descriptive study the data were collected (n = 397) with probability sampling from health care professionals and members of The Union of Health and Social Care Professionals in Finland Tehy. The data were collected with questionnaire: “Whistleblowing -väärinkäytösten paljastaminen terveydenhuollossa” developed for this study and by using Webropol questionnaire -software during 26.6.-17.7.2015. The data were analyzed statistically. According to the results of this study health care professionals had suspected (67 %) and observed (66 %) wrongdoing in health care, more often than once a month (30%). Mostly were suspected (37 %) and observed (36%) inadequacy of the personnel and least violence toward the patient (3 %). Wrongdoing was whistle blown (suspected 29 %, observed 40 %) primarily inside the organization to the closest supervisor (76 %), face-to-face (88 %). Mostly the whistle was blown on nurses’ wrongdoing (58 %). Whistleblowing act didn’t end the wrongdoing (52 %) and whistleblowing had negative consequences to the whistleblower such as discrimination by the manager (35 %). Respondents with work experience less than ten years (62 %), working in temporary position (75 %) or in management position (88 %) were, more unwilling to blow the whistle. Whistleblowing should be conducted internally, to the closest manager in writing and anonymously. Wrongdoing should be dealt between the parties involved, and written warning should ensue from wrongdoing. According to the results of this study whistleblowing on wrongdoing in health care causes negative consequences to the whistleblower. In future, attention in health care should be paid to preventing wrongdoing and enhancing whistleblowing in order to decrease wrongdoing and lessen the consequences that whistleblowers face after blowing the whistle.

The role of emotions in value creation for families in pediatric health care

The purpose of this study was to analyze emotions related to a child’s critical illness from the perspective of the family and discuss the link those emotions might form with value creation. High quality service is of paramount importance in hospital care, especially when a child is diagnosed with critical illness. Through the analysis of patient family emotions and their triggers, the study was aiming to deepen the understanding of value creation for customer. Therefore, the research sought to find answers to the following three sub-questions: 1. What are the emotions experienced? 2. What triggers them? 3. How are the emotions linked to amelioration or aggravation of value for patient and family? The theoretical background of this research is built on two core concepts: emotions and value creation. As both concepts are wide and multifaceted, the research concentrates on viewing emotions from the applicable cognitive angle, identifying and categorizing emotions in a general level. Value creation is studied from the service perspective, discussing the possible relations between emotions and value creation. Moreover, the suitability of views regarding customer value co-creation to health care encounters is analyzed. Qualitative approach was selected as the most appropriate methodology for conducting the empirical research. The empirical data was collected from public blogs, for which a total of 18 blogs were reviewed. Five blogs were selected for the analysis, which had the intent of identifying the emotions experienced by patient families and deepening the knowledge of their role in value creation during health care service encounters. The empirical study of this research discovered a wide range of positive and negative emotions, which denotes that a severe life situation does not prevent the feeling of positive emotions. Furthermore, by combining the empirical findings to the theoretical background, this study concludes that recognizing and treating the patient family as a partner and value creator is essential. The high quality technical aspect of care is vital, but it is not the sole attribute for service quality, as the interpersonal communication plays a large role in the customer’s overall assessment of the health care performance. The patients and their families largely evaluate the service encounter based on their perceptions, thus emotions play a significant role. Depending on the service experience, value maybe created or destructed. Hence, this study posits emotion at the core of the service encounter, indicating towards the importance of active assessment of customer perceptions and the recognition of the emotional states

Whistleblowing process in Finnish health care

Wrongdoing in health care is harmful action that jeopardizes patient safety and can be targeted at the patient or employees. Wrongdoing can vary from illegal, unethical or unprofessional action to inappropriate behavior in the workplace. Whistleblowing can be considered as a process where wrongdoing is suspected or oberved in health care by health care professionals and disclosed to the party that can influence the wrongful action. Whistleblowing causes severe harm to the whistleblower and to the object of whistleblowing complaint, to their personnel life and working community. The aim of this study was to analyze whistleblowing process in Finnish health care. The overall goal is to raise concern about wrongdoing and whistleblowing in Finnish health care. In this cross-sectional descriptive study the data were collected (n = 397) with probability sampling from health care professionals and members of The Union of Health and Social Care Professionals in Finland Tehy. The data were collected with questionnaire: “Whistleblowing -väärinkäytösten paljastaminen terveydenhuollossa” developed for this study and by using Webropol questionnaire -software during 26.6.-17.7.2015. The data were analyzed statistically. According to the results of this study health care professionals had suspected (67 %) and observed (66 %) wrongdoing in health care, more often than once a month (30%). Mostly were suspected (37 %) and observed (36%) inadequacy of the personnel and least violence toward the patient (3 %). Wrongdoing was whistle blown (suspected 29 %, observed 40 %) primarily inside the organization to the closest supervisor (76 %), face-to-face (88 %). Mostly the whistle was blown on nurses’ wrongdoing (58 %). Whistleblowing act didn’t end the wrongdoing (52 %) and whistleblowing had negative consequences to the whistleblower such as discrimination by the manager (35 %). Respondents with work experience less than ten years (62 %), working in temporary position (75 %) or in management position (88 %) were, more unwilling to blow the whistle. Whistleblowing should be conducted internally, to the closest manager in writing and anonymously. Wrongdoing should be dealt between the parties involved, and written warning should ensue from wrongdoing. According to the results of this study whistleblowing on wrongdoing in health care causes negative consequences to the whistleblower. In future, attention in health care should be paid to preventing wrongdoing and enhancing whistleblowing in order to decrease wrongdoing and lessen the consequences that whistleblowers face after blowing the whistle.

The importance of environmental sustainability in public procurement of medical devices in health care sector

The aim of this thesis was to examine the role of environmental sustainability in the procurement of medical devices in health care sector. Current literature is mainly focused on other product groups and medical devices have been left without sufficient attention. Nevertheless, EU has recently developed green public procurement criteria for medical devices (EU GPP criteria for health care EEE) in order to support and offer guidelines for purchasers in hospitals. In this study, the criteria were used as a framework in order to examine the most significant environmental aspects for medical devices. The empirical research was executed in Finnish public hospitals with mixed method approach; quantitative data was collected by a survey and qualitative data was collected by interviews held for procurement specialists. The focus was on understanding the importance of environmental sustainability in the procurement of medical devices and which environmentally sustainable features would be the most significant. Of interest was also the medical device supplier view and how they could take environmental sustainability into consideration.

Smart homes as service platforms. Research report of ÄLYKOP sub-project “Competitive advantage from customer value”

In this report, we summarize results of our part of the ÄLYKOP-project on customer value creation in the intersection of the health care, ICT, forest and energy industries. The research directs to describe how industry transformation and convergence create new possibilities, business opportunities and even new industries.The report consists of findings which are presented former in academic publications. The publication discusses on customer value, service provision and resource basis of the novel concepts through multiple theorethical frameworks. The report is divided into three maim sections which are theoretical background, discussion on health care industry and evaluations regarding novel smart home concepts. Transaction cost economics and Resource- Based view on the firm provides the theoretical basis to analyze the prescribed phenomena. The health care industry analysis describes the most important changes in the demand conditions of health care services, and explores the features that are likely to open new business opportunities for a solution provider. The third part of the report on the smart home business provides illustrations few potential concepts that can be considered to provide solutions to economical problems which arise from aging of population. The results provide several recommendations for the smart home platform developers in public and private sectors. By the analysis, public organizations dominate service provision and private markets are emergent state at present. We argue that public-private partnerships are nececssary for creating key suppliers. Indeed, paying attion on appropriate regulation, service specifications and technology standards would foster diffusion of new services. The dynamics of the service provision networks is driven by need for new capabiltities which are required for adapting business concepts to new competitive situation. Finally, the smart home framework revealed links between conventionally distant business areas such as health care and energy distribution. The platform integrates functionalities different for purposes which however apply same resource basis.